Like Many, Buffalo Bills Fumbling Pass to Heirs

BUFFALO (TheStreet) -- Those who still question the merits of succession planning should talk with fans of the National Football League's Buffalo Bills about the state of the team and owner Ralph C. Wilson Jr.

A 290-pound linebacker charging at them helmet-first at full speed would be less frightening.

With the Bills now 0-5 this season, two weeks removed from their first local television blackout in nearly five years and two weeks from their annual "home" game in Toronto, the future of the team is about as clear as Buffalo roads during a Western New York lake-effect snowstorm. The Buffalo market's position among the NFL's smallest and the team's losing record since 2004 has fans and pundits speculating that the yearly trip to Toronto's Rogers Center may be a test drive for a move across the border.

Buffalo Bills owner Ralph C. Wilson Jr., 91, is an example of a lack of succession planning in U.S. businesses.

Such speculation could be easily confirmed or denied if the 91-year-old Wilson -- the NFL's oldest owner, who has no intention to move the team during his tenure -- laid out a succession plan. Instead, the Bills join the more than half of North American public and private companies who cannot immediately name a successor to their chief executive, according to a study completed this year by Heidrick & Struggles and Stanford University's Rock Center for Corporate Governance.

"It's advisable that the succession process begin at least three to five years before," says Mass Mutual adviser Louis F. Grammes of uFinancial in Central Pennsylvania. "You should take the time to make sure you leave your business in style. And if you wait until the last minute, the valuation of your business is going to be in question."

That's already an issue for the franchise. The Bills' value has dropped 12%, from $909 million last year to $799 million this year, according to Forbes. That's only $74 million more than the lowest-valued team, the Jacksonville Jaguars, and is heavily influenced by the $93 million value of 37-year-old Ralph Wilson Stadium and $45 million in ticket receipts, both ranking in the lowest quarter of the league. That's a steep markup from the $25,000 Wilson paid for the team in 1959, but still representative of the team's financial shortcomings, which are ranked at 28th out the league's 32 franchises.

The Bills' value and the fortunes of its surrounding city have taken divergent paths since the 1950s. Buffalo's population has shrunk to little more than 270,000 people from its peak of more than 580,000 in 1950; and while the greater metropolitan area has more than 1.1 million people, it's not even close to the Toronto area's 5.4 million. The region is coping with 25% poverty, 7.6% unemployment, a 43% slip in home sales -- and the Bills just hiked ticket prices prices 15%, which still gives them the third-lowest ticket price in the league at $59.19, according to Team Marketing Report. While the team's vague-to-nonexistent plan for a future without Wilson can't be blamed for all of Buffalo's misfortunes, like the 39% of North American businesses that the Heidrick &Struggles/Stanford survey says have "zero" viable candidates for succession, it's already hurting the value of the franchise.